Good news for Cord Cutters: Last Olympics, if you didn’t have NBC via cable, satellite or some other platform you were out of luck. This time around all Olympics content will be available via NBC’s streaming service, Peacock.
TV Broadcasts
NBC has the rights to all Olympic content in the USA and they currently plan to produce 2-3 handball matches/day for broadcast on NBC TV networks. Some matches will be broadcast live, but if past Olympics are a guide, most will will be shown on a tape delay basis. A quick look ahead at the schedule shows that most matches be shown on the USA Network with a few on E! and CNBC. There are also temporary channels being set up called Paris Extra 1 and Paris Extra 2.
Web Streaming
NBC will be streaming every handball match live and on demand. And, there will be two ways that viewers can access the web streams.
- If you already have NBC through a cable, satellite or another platform like Fubo or YouTube TV you will be able to stream content after authenticating your subscription. You do not need a Peacock subscription.
- If you are a cord cutter, however, your best option will be to subscribe to NBC’s streaming service, Peacock for access to all of NBC’s Olympic content
Here are some handy notes and links
- NBC Schedule Page for Handball: Link
- You can select “TV & Digital” or “TV only” The TV & Digital option will show you every single match as every match is streamed while the TV Only option will show you the traditional broadcast viewings
- As Handball is one of the few sports starting before the opening ceremonies on Friday there will be 3 live broadcasts Thurdsay all aired on the USA network at 3 AM, 5 AM and 1 PM (US ET)
- The first 12 days of competition will have 6 matches played each day with the same starting times. Those times are
- Paris (Local): 0900, 1100, 1400, 1600, 1900, 2100
- US (ET): 0300, 0500, 0800, 1000, 1300, 1500
- With some matches being played early in the morning, U.S. time, you may want to watch those matches later in the day without knowing the score. Thankfully, it appears that the NBC schedule page will be spoiler free.
Commentators
NBC TV broadcasts will have commentary with Eric Frede and Dawn Lewis. Digitally streamed matches will use the Olympic Broadcast Service feed and will have commentary from Paul Bray, Mark Hawkins and others. Here’s some more information on the commentators:
- Eric Frede (NBC Play by Play): Eric Frede is a veteran commentator based in New England who has called multiple sports to include football, basketball, baseball, hockey, soccer, lacrosse, softball, volleyball, tennis, track and field and auto racing NBC Bio
- Dawn Allinger Lewis (NBC Color/Expert): Lewis was a member of the 1996 U.S. Women’s Olympic Handball squad and this will be her 6th straight Olympics with NBC NBC Bio
- Paul Pray (OBS): Bray is the dean of handball commentators and has been calling handball matches for over 30 years. Previously he was also the President of British Handball
- Mark Hawkins (OBS): Hawkins was a member of the 2012 Great Britain Handball team and is the current head coach of the Great Britains Women’s team
- 2017 interview with the Uninformed Handball Hour podcast: Link